Einstein's sink is a well-known object among physics and astronomy students
at Leiden University. Stories about its origin have been passed down since it
was moved to the large lecture room of the then newly built Oort Building in
1998. These stories claim that it was seen as an Einstein relic by the physics
faculty, kept close to inspire young minds. After researching this story, I
found that the sink is from the early 20th century and that it once stood in
the large lecture room of the Kamerlingh Onnes Laboratory in Leiden. It is
likely that at this time it was used by many scientists, including Einstein.
However, my research also shows that the move from the KOL was done purely for
financial reasons and had nothing to do with Einstein. It is possible that the
story was made up to conceal this fact, creating a more appealing reason for
these cutbacks. The sink is seen by many as a connection to Einstein's and the
university's past and is liked for this fact and not the aforementioned legend.

What, if any, was Einstein's biggest mistake, the one most affecting our
physics today? There is a perhaps apocryphal story, recounted by George Gamow,
that he counted his cosmological constant as his biggest blunder. We now know
his hypothesized cosmological constant to be correct. His lifelong rejection of
quantum mechanics, an interesting side-story in the evolution of 20th-century
physics, is a candidate. None of these introduced difficulties in how our
physics is done today. It can be argued that his biggest actual mistake, one
that affects many subfields of physics and chemistry and bewilders students
today, occurred in his naming of his A and B coefficients.